Post(card) Ideological IconsWhat About revisiting the hardcore shapes of the avant-garde?

It has been almost a century since the air was heavily saturated with the combustible gas of ideology. Almost a hundred years have passed since everything from film,throughartand architecture, to urbanism was susceptibletotheslightestfriction in the atmosphere sparking endless manifestoes and multiple visions of the perennial “new beginning”. But what happens when the ideological fire that fuels urbanismis extinguished, andinits place just smoke remains? What is left after the idealistic energy of the avant-garde has vanished and we are left with necrophilic icons of dead ideologies? Why aren’t we able to see the striking similarities and contrasting disparities between the avatars of yesterday’s ideological urbanism and today’s pop-architectural icons?In the twenties imaginarytautwires, steel trusses, and structural concrete gave form to the muscular monuments of a Potemkinesqueavant-garde. Utopia had a shape. First, it looked like a steel tower spiraling hastily towards the sky, then like a leaningtribune for Lenin, then it took the shape ofasky hook fearlessly cantilevering above the debris of the old city, and of a flying city, soaring in circles weightlessly through the firmament. Not only had the avant-garde announced a victory over the sun, but it promised to use urbanism to melt into air all the solid problems of society.

But,at the point when all possible sorts of fantastic operations on the city were about to be orchestrated, the urban intelligentsia crashedheadlong intoan ideological wall.If the dreams of the avant-garde werean improbable mission when their idealistic nostalgia was at its peak, it became almost impossible for them to succeed with a looming economic meltdown, asphyxiating ideological persecutions, and the authorities’ sudden aesthetic preference for neo-classical kitsch—who can forget Boris Iofan’s cake-shaped tower? In the midst of the suffocating pessimism of the sociopolitical atmosphere of the post-war, the avant-garde managed to find an ideological plateau, and develop in it one last (desperate?) plan. With the catastrophic arrival of the Second World War, Utopia had to change shape. If before the war, urbanism was about tabula rasa, and the ideal new cities were to substitute the old urban fabric with ideological monuments, the new urbanism promised to leave the old cities untouched. The new avant-garde proposed to disguise its ideal cities as colossal buildings that could be developedad infinitum; urbanism as endless architecture.The second—and last— coming of ideological urbanism in the 20thcentury happened fifty years ago. Aroused by the promising future of the new communication, transportation and construction technologies, the new forms of urbanism were grafted around metabolic systems of urbanization, prefabricated instant cities, and Megastructures.

Anew ontology of urban forms was created after a whole new cosmos of ideal cities took over the collective intelligence of urbanism. The image of urbanism suffered a dramatic transformation as ideological cities hovered like weightless blankets above the Champs-Élysées, mirror-coated monuments roamed endlessly through the streets of Graz, pixilated buildings, helix-shaped towers, and mushroom-cloud megaliths metabolically proliferated all over Tokyo, geodesic domes sequestered complete areas of Manhattan island, and entire cities were pictured strolling over the surface of the world’s oceans.

Yet again, so suspicious were the proposals of an avant-garde so detached from reality, so economically unfeasible, so ideologically naïve, that they never found (outside of Japan) any possible application or a client devout enough to believe in their projects.Today’s generation of media-wise, economically proficient, politically correct architects have decided to resurrect the shapes of the most subversive and energetic forms of urbanism of the last century. In the form of an opportunistic architecturalcadavre-exquis(started by one, finished by the other) contemporary urbanismhas,under the slogan “the stronger the ideal, the sharper the icons” unearthed some of the most the striking proposals of the avant-garde and repurposed them as harmless and ready to consume coffee-table images.

Like when an archeological discovery loses its history-rich past to the frivolity of the museum walls, the icons of the ideological avant-garde have been sterilized, reupholstered and servedup to an image-starvingaudience that devours them as visual gourmet whileoverlooking their original potential. Prosthetic appendixes of ideologies that expired decades ago, these architectures now captivate the flash of the cameras and win the praise of the critics due to their bold shapes, iconic presence, and their historical ideological references. Exhaustively photographed, printed, blogged, discussed, awarded, these urban forms have metamorphosed from being the icons of a revolution to being the pretty faces of architectural mass media; hardcore urban ideology as architectural soft porn.

Post(cards)Agitational provocations in the form of architecturalpost(cards), the following images have been structured to stimulate the critical understanding of ideological urbanism, to recognize the use of iconographic architecture as itsdeus ex machinaand to identify the recycling of its most intense proposals by contemporary architecture.By meticulously selecting two formally related buildings and grafting them together like pictures of an alternative reality, the images have the potential to expose two opposed instances in the evolution of urbanism; first as ideological enterprises, then as harmless architectural icons. Onthe left side of thepost(cards)stand the icons of the urban intelligentsia. Product of their zeitgeist, these buildings share an intense and turbulent history that saw them rise from the collective nostalgia of the ideological optimistic years of the avant-garde, onlythento be crumbled away by the inexorable forces of modernity like sand castles in front of a tsunami. The images display symptomatic manifestations of hardcore ideological urbanism in the form of constructivist sky-hooks, non-objective architectons, and metabolist helicoids.

Standing at the opposite side of the image, a series of contemporary architectures strikingly resemble their ideological predecessors. Like organs without a body, these icons’ lack of any clear ideological manifesto, put into evidence how contemporary architecture not only borrows its shapes, but that through image overexposure, and over use, neutralizes the inherent potential of previous forms of ideological urbanism. The new icons offer no hidden subversive messages, state no unprecedented manifestoes, and represent no underground ideologies. Themore they become infatuated with their own image, the more they become like Architectural postcards.

As part of the SA Forum, WAI will be presenting its solo exhibition What About It? from the 10 to the 17 of December, and offering a lecture and discussion the 15 of the same month in the prestigious School of Architecture of Tsinghua University in Beijing.

The SA Forum is an initiative to enable independent exchange and interaction at Tsinghua University. It was first initiated in 2010 by Martijn de Geus and is now jointly hosted by the Graduate Student Union at the School of Architecture, and it’s EPMA-Program (English Program for Master in Architecture). The Topic of the 2011/12 academic year is ‘Towards a Future Habitat.’

An article about the origins of WAI has been featured in the “Por Dentro” section of Puerto Rico’s main newspaper El Nuevo Dia. Written by Eileen Rivera Esquilin, the article and interview published Saturday 19 of November highlights the journey of WAI through Europe, China, and its relationship with Puerto Rico.

For more information please go to the online version of the article in endi.com.

The last copies of the WAIzine, and the Catalog of the first solo exhibition of WAI have been acquired and are on sale on William Stout Architectural Books. The famous bookshop has two stores in San Francisco and one in Berkeley.

“William Stout Architectural Books carries over 20,000 titles on two floors in the fields of architecture, art, urban planning, graphic and industrial design, furniture and interior design, and landscape architecture. For over thirty years, twenty in the current location, it has been a vital resource for architecture and design books, carrying American and international titles, both in and out of print.”[1]

The Archizines exhibition opened successfully to the public with a series of discussions in the Architectural Association in London. The show that displays 60 contemporary architectural publications will be on display until the 14th of December. Curated by Elias Redstone, Archizines finds an outlet for the electrifying energy behind the small magazines that still have faith in the power of printed architecture in an age anesthetized by redundant pixels.

Coinciding again with a global crisis —as in the sixties— Archizines marks the renaissance of a critical architectural youth that through printed, stapled, and bind pages claims for a space to express its ideas. After the few remaining “radical” magazines from the sixties ended up as commercial publications, a new faith is put on the experimental nature of the fanzine.

What About It?

WAI Architecture Think Tank is a Workshop for Architecture Intelligentsia founded in Brussels in 2008 by architects, artists and writers Nathalie Frankowski and Cruz Garcia. Currently based in Beijing, WAI focuses on the understanding and execution of architecture through a panoramic approach, from groundbreaking theoretical texts, to critical narrative architectures, innovative publications and exhibitions, and intelligent urban and architectural projects. WAI asks What About It?

What About the Foam Manifesto?

WAI is about foam ideas. A product of a moment in time, WAI surges when thinking is being “overlooked” and the abrasive emptiness of imagery overflow and empty foam shapes threatens to saturate the architectural domain. WAI dares to challenge foam models with foam ideas. WAI proposes a subversion of the foam. If for the Pop-Architectures of today foam is just a material to make shapes, for WAI foam is a structure that generates endless cognitive connections. Our visual world is being bombarded by a constant lack of substance. WAI proposes substance behind the images. WAI proposes substance with the images. WAI is hypothetical. WAI dares to propose. WAI embraces discussions, dialogue and arguments. WAI dares to think. WAI is a Think Tank for the contemporary City and its Architecture. WAI is a Think Tank for the contemporary Architecture and its City. More and more, more frivolity is pontificated, and less substance is produced. WAI proposes a theory of alchemism— to transform quantity into thoughts, shapes into ideas, frivolity into substance. The more that is produced the more WAI thinks. WAI worries about triviality and inquires about sophistication. WAI is a Workshop for Architecture Intelligentsia. WAI asks…What About It?

What About Wall Stalker (Video)?

What About Le Poème de WAI (Video)

What About Lectures?

What About Internship?

Applicants interested should submit an individual Portfolio in a pdf file (5mb max, no online links), CV and cover letter with “internship” in the subject tocontact@wai-architecture.com. Candidates should be familiar with the theoretical background of WAI, posses a very strong overall knowledge of contemporary architecture and have critical thinking skills.

Applicants should have design proficiency and good written and visual communication capabilities. WAI is a contemporary think tank of architecture, applicants should be prepared to work in an unusual environment. Students are invited to apply.

Requirements:-Proficiency in written and spoken English is a must. Chinese is a plus.-Excellent model making skills-Strong graphic and design capabilities- Design software knowledge-Critical knowledge of contemporary architecture

What About Reading Us?

What about the Authors?

Nathalie Frankowskiis a French Architect, Artist, and Author who graduated in 2008 from the department of Architecture, Art and Philosophy at the École Nationale Supérieure d’Architecture de Paris La Villette with a Diplome d’État d’Architecture option research. Her final project “It Feels Like Home: Chez-soi entre nature et densité” received the special mention from the jury.In 2008 she co-founded WAI a contemporary think tank for architecture and the city. Previous professional and academic experience includes international publications, research, film making, design workshops and working in Belgium, The Netherlands, France, and China.

Cruz García is a Puerto Rican Architect, Artist, and Author who graduated in 2008 from the Universidad de Puerto Rico with a Master Degree in Architecture after earning the Alpha Rho Chi Medal for outstanding leadership and the Henry Adams Medal for the Highest Degree. His research thesis about Narrative Architectures from the 1920’s to the 70’s earned him the PBDT scholarship from the main research institution in the UPR. In 2008 he co-founded WAI a contemporary think tank for architecture and the city. Previous professional and academic experience includes international publications, research, teaching, lectures, and working in Belgium, The Netherlands, Puerto Rico, USA, France, and China.